Fiction writer. Expert procrastinator. This is my life.
Wow. I hadn’t realized how much having a story around that I needed to publish was dragging me down. I feel a lot lighter now that it’s done.
So, that makes short story #2 for the year, while the novella #1 is still unfinished. But it’s close to being done finally. It really is. I swear! :)
Oops … if I have a 100 word minimum, I broke my streak yesterday. However, I did write. Only I wrote 58 words, not 100.
Then today, I just haven’t done it. The change in routine with the school year ending is throwing me off, but really, I just didn’t want to write. Sigh.
This just isn’t working.
I should clarify. My new routine is working quite well. I’m exercising. I’m no longer snacking between meals. I’m not feeling as fatigued as I was. So that’s great. I’m just not writing during the times I have set aside for writing. That’s … problematic.
As for the money thing, well, that’s easy. Apparently money has no motivational power over me at all. I mean, maybe if I was starving or something, but since I’m not… Yeah.
I just don’t understand why I keep trying the same things over and over, except … I kind of do. I forget. I forget why it didn’t work, or I think something’s different this time so I won’t have the same outcome—but then I do. And I shouldn’t be surprised, but I always am.
I don’t know how to overcome that. I don’t know how to make myself remember that I’ve tried the “hours thing” before and couldn’t get it to work for me. Although basing my writing goals around the time I spend writing seems rational and doable, when I put it into action, I end up feeling like I’m trapped, and I avoid writing as if I hate it. As if—ah…
I think I get it now. As if it’s a job.
I just can’t keep doing this to myself. I know better. Treating writing as a job in the sense that most people think of “job” just doesn’t work for me.
I have to take the time scheduling off the table, completely, forever, else I’m just going to try this again in a few months and have this happen all over again.
I sincerely hope this is the last “schedule” post I ever write.
Here’s my plan for the rest of the year: enjoy my writing life and give myself a break.
This doesn’t mean I can’t have goals and dreams and continue attempting to improve as a writer. I will write—I don’t doubt that. I will try to reach a weekly word count goal, and I will continue to try to write every day, because that’s what I do.
Frankly, I don’t have a choice if I want to keep earning a living with my writing. But that doesn’t mean I should spend so much time driving myself crazy with perfectionism—not with the writing itself (I seem to have that under control), but with how much writing I do and how often, because I’m never satisfied. It’s never enough. It will never be enough for the perfectionist in me.
So here’s how much I’d like to write each week—a realistic number that’s going to get me to the number of books I would like to publish each year. 13,535. It’s not my lowest recorded word count for a week and it’s not my highest, so it’s realistic for me. It’s a modest number, and if I don’t make it each week, so be it.
I’d like to do this in conjunction with continuing to write on multiple stories each day, because that’s working for me, and it’s refreshing to be able to switch stories when things get all tangled up in my head. The breaks always seem to do me good.
But it’s just something to keep me focused.
And that’s it.
I will still probably have days where I’ll want to challenge myself—because it can be fun to do that sometimes, but my days will be devoted to enjoying the writing life as much as possible and learning how to let go of the perfectionistic ideals of what my writing life should be like.
Just figured out what my wasted time is worth in dollars, and wow, I’m really kind of embarrassed that I don’t write more, knowing what I know.
You know when people tell you that you should write even if you can just fit in ten minutes here and five minutes there? Yeah. Those people are the smart ones.
Based on my 2014 published words, what income I’ve generated this year, and my average writing speed per hour, I’m passing up $0.90 every single minute that I choose to do something other than write on one of my upcoming releases (income growth is spurred on by new releases—my baseline is going up, even though month to month income drops as more time passes between releases). Basically, I can theoretically earn at least $10 on every 11 minutes of writing I do. And that’s now, without the added growth that a bigger backlist of books could bring me.
All this means is that I should really be spending more time writing and less time doing other stuff.
And yet. Here I am. Gah!
Update: 1,299 words! Yay! Not great as far as WPH, but at least I didn’t end the day with <100 again. :D The majority of those words were for my 2014 novella #1.
It’s Sunday! Yes, lately I always seem to screw up Saturday and then try to do better on Sunday.
So that’s the plan today. Do better.
I’m supposed to be following my routine but here it is 12:25 PM and I’ve napped (yes! I did! At 8:20–9 AM!). I’ve visited a few forums. I’ve called my mother (and talked for a very long time). I’ve read a few other forums. And blogs. And looked at sales reports.
What I haven’t done is sit down and write.
I’m going to go ahead and try to stick to my routine, hoping that as I add more activity to my day, my fatigue will ease up and I’ll feel more like getting started in the mornings. If that doesn’t work after a few days to a week, I’ll rearrange some stuff so that I can just do my writing in the afternoons.
For today, though, I’ll be revisiting the writing at 2 PM when I’m supposed to do publishing stuff and reading, and write until 6 PM, because I must get in 4 hours of writing today or I owe someone some money. :D Because yeah, I made a bet I could get in my 4 hours today.
Day #3: 30 words
Seriously, I did those words just to keep the streak alive. It’s embarrassing.
Next up, setting a minimum word count to qualify for the streak!
100? It is a minimum, after all.
Maybe I’ll go up to 250 eventually!
I’d say tomorrow is going to be a much better day, but I have no idea, and technically, I’m writing this on Sunday morning anyway, so it’s already today instead of tomorrow. ;)
I’ve created a new routine for myself to start tomorrow. It’s a schedule—but I’m calling it a routine. For reasons.
I’ve been having a bit of trouble with fatigue, and I’m not sure if it’s because I’m not as active as I should be or because of other reasons, but the new routine adds in some time for me to exercise daily. I’m going to do it, because if I don’t, I’m going to keep feeling too old for my age, and who wants that?
I’ve been mulling over the quote I found so inspiring the other day and a few other things besides, and I’ve managed to come up with what looks to be a nice little routine. It addresses my entire day, gives me plenty of time for family, reading, exercise, eating, writing, and publishing. It’s probably not going to get me to one million words, unless I miraculously start writing 1,000 WPH, but it’s a nice, livable routine that will make every day a joy to live and work. I can’t ask for more than that.
It’s an experiment, and failure’s always an option, so none of that neener neener crap if I crash and burn, okay? ;)
I’m highlighting writing related items, mentioning when I expect to exercise, and leaving the rest out.
8 to 12 : writing
exercise
2 to 4 : publishing (or extra writing time) (or extra reading time)
4 to 6 : reading
When I’m racing a deadline, I can convert both the publishing and reading time to writing time. But my real goal? To become so enmeshed in my daily routine that I never need to do that.
Four hours of writing every day will get me a book a month at the length I’m most fond of and at my current average 552 words per hour. Also, the more into the routine I get, my hope is that my hourly average will increase—more words, same amount of time.
I unpublished some posts this morning, because of … reasons!
Some of those reasons are because I got up and had second thoughts about some of the things I said in them.
I’m just in one of those moods. I’m not sure if I’ll put them back up or not—I’m still thinking about it.
I came across a great quote today, one that surprised and pleased me and seemed to come at just the right time since I’ve been mulling over the why and why nots of having a schedule and why it might be time for me to get back to mine.
How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing. A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days. It is a scaffolding on which a worker can stand and labor with both hands at sections of time. A schedule is a mock-up of reason and order—willed, faked, and so brought into being; it is a peace and a haven set into the wreck of time; it is a lifeboat on which you find yourself, decades later, still living. Each day is the same, so you remember the series afterward as a blurred and powerful pattern.
This quote, from The Writing Life by Annie Dillard, which I came across at Brain Pickings in “How We Spend Our Days Is How We Spend Our Lives: Annie Dillard on Presence Over Productivity,” resonated. I haven’t thought of a schedule in quite this way before, and I like the idea that a schedule isn’t so much a prison as it is a scaffolding and a haven.
I could use a haven; frankly, I could use some scaffolding.
I love the idea of looking back and seeing “a blurred and powerful pattern” in my days past.
I’m going to build my scaffolding from my old schedule, and following another piece of advice from someone else, I’m going to start the day with creative work first.
Failure is always an option, but I don’t mind. Gotta (re)start somewhere. :)
Hmm. This is so embarrassing. But hey, at least it’s a streak, right? :D
Day #1 : 61
Day #2 : 206
Hmm. Time for some conclusions!
The word count issues I keep coming up against are just a symptom of a bigger issue. Time. Time is where I’m falling short and letting myself down.
I mean, it doesn’t change the fact that procrastination is still a problem—truly, a symptom of a different issue, or that I still have to work on motivating myself, blah, blah, blah, but worrying about word counts without worrying about the amount of time I’m devoting to my writing seems very short-sighted.
There’s a solution to my word count woes and it’s a simple one. Spend more time writing. :D
My focus should be on consistently putting in more time. Back in February 2012, I had a fantastic month—a month of the most consistent writing output I’ve ever had (truly, ever). I averaged over three hours of writing a day. That kind of consistency could do wonders for my writing and my income. More practice, more published stories, more money.
If I want to be sure I put in more time consistently, then I need structure.
It’s time to start writing every day.
I would never depend on one backup. I back up my works at least once daily, often twice, to Google Drive, Dropbox, an SD card, a networked computer’s hard-drive (which I back up to an external hard-drive), and then I throw in the occasional email of my WIPs to a secondary and tertiary email account and a DVD backup.
I also copy my main works directory monthly to create a monthly snapshot of it on my main writing computer’s hard-drive.
This all works like a charm and doesn’t take me but seconds to do. I use Spacejock Software’s yCopy2 and saved jobs to make doing these backups simple and quick. It’s as easy as clicking a shortcut link for each backup I want to run.
After every day’s work, I copy my WIP files to a backup directory so that I have a complete daily record of what I’ve written (or deleted). If I work on a WIP for 80 days, then I end up with at least 80 copies in the backup directory. I say “at least” because if I take a break, sometimes I back up then too, and if I know I’m about to do any kind of editing or redrafting, I back up then.
I regularly check that my copies of these files are present where they’re supposed to be and that they open without any problems.
That’s how I back up my writing.
As far as backing up other files: pictures, letters, emails, program settings, even my Calibre library of nearly 800 ebooks? I don’t even bother. It’s kind of funny. I really need to get on that…
When I quit my job and turned writing and publishing into my sole work, I thought I would write a lot more. :D Obviously, I am not that person.
Since early April, I’ve allowed myself to freely write on multiple stories each day instead of constraining myself to only the one I want completed first.
So far I’ve put almost all my effort into six projects: my early 2014 novella, two novels I need done ASAP, a new novel meant for a new pen name, and two short stories (one of which is done and needs only to be published).
Getting that story publishing should be a high priority but every time I sit down to format it, I get distracted. Yeah. I’m really not acting in my own best interests here. ;)
For the moment, I’m looking for a way to pump up my word counts this month, on those specific projects I need to finish, by focusing on the one million words challenge. Now that I feel like I’ve had a bit of a breakthrough, I think I can meet the word count goals I’ll need to meet to end the year with those one million words of fiction. :D
The math as of today: 905,523 words left to write / 232 days left in the year = 3,903 words per day.
The good news is that although that will be tough, it’s doable.
I need to revisit the idea of a daily time quota, and that may not be my favorite idea, but it’s time to do whatever I need to do to get me where I want to go. I honestly believe I can still meet the one million words challenge but I’m going to have to keep improving and pushing.
I’ve always said I want to be prolific. I want to write a lot—and I mean a LOT—of books.
If that’s truly what I want, then I probably need to get busy making that happen.
I’m bored. Not of my books (although you’d think so after today’s determined efforts to procrastinate), not of this site, but of these progress posts.
I thought they’d be helpful or motivational or something, but they’re really not doing anything for me.
So this could be the last “progress” note. I even created a category for them.
Ah, well. I’ll just use it for something else. I still haven’t renamed the “It’s a Job” category either. I might not.
Right now, I’m sitting at -255 words.
I deleted some stuff with the intent to write on that story and then I gave in to the fact that I just don’t feel well. I think I have an ear infection or something. My ear hurts. And I’m very tired. And although I had big plans—HUGE plans—for my writing today, when it came down to it, I just didn’t feel like writing.
So here’s to a better day tomorrow and calling it a night tonight.
—Working to increase my daily average word count
Made it to 454. Ugh. Headache never did really go away. MUST do better tomorrow.
Hoping to have a great day today but I’ve gotta get rid of this headache or writing’s going to be tough.
NOTE: I decided to make an effort to read more books this year. And since I have so many unread books, I set a goal to read at least 60 of the books in my backlog by the end of the year. I’m even keeping a log. :)
Seems like I’m getting off to a great start on my effort to read more fiction—possibly to the detriment of my writing, but … doubt any of these books have taken away a moment of time when I both had the energy and the inclination to write, so I don’t really believe that.
I read Hounded yesterday, and this is the book I originally started reading after book #1, but in fact, had actually started reading the first time back in November 2011, and I remember that because I posted the book to another site I run with the note that it and the follow ups were must-buys after I’d finished the sample. Well, LOL, that right there says LOTS about my reading habits. I buy books and then don’t read them for nearly 3 years! [That’s a bit of a lie; I have books that I’ve had much longer than 3 years that I haven’t read yet. You’ll see.]
Here’s another example:
See this book? It’s by one of my favorite authors. It’s been sitting on my side table since September last year. I finally started it in December, and for some reason stopped and that bookmark’s been there ever since! I liked this book; I have no idea why I haven’t finished reading it yet. It’ll probably end up as one of my 60 this year.
Anyway, Hounded is the first book in The Iron Druid Chronicles, a series I’ve been meaning to read for a really long time. I’m glad I finally got around to the book because I really enjoyed it. Lots of action, lots of humor, and lots of fun.
Not much writing done over the weekend, but like I said a while back, weekends just don’t seem to be good writing days most weeks. This was one of those weeks.
Saturday I made it to 337 pretty early, but then never got back to it.
Sunday I didn’t write a word of fiction although I did write a nice, long note to myself about the coming weekdays and what I need to get done. :D It was boring number crunching so I’m not going to bother repeating any of it here.
My conclusion: I need to pick up some serious speed. :D To get to one million words of fiction in 2014, I’m going to have to start averaging almost 3,900 a day. Since I’m not writing much on the weekends at the moment, that means I’ve got to start having some killer good weekdays. Possible, just not likely if I don’t do something different than I’ve been doing.
—Working to increase my daily average word count
Made it to 1,175 after a 4 hour midday interruption. Thought I was going to come home and write but I didn’t feel well, and in fact, I never did feel better, so I just ended up reading a book.
9:28 am: 452
10:58 am: 939
3:08 pm: 1,101
3:49 pm: 1,175
NOTE: I decided to make an effort to read more books this year. And since I have so many unread books, I set a goal to read at least 60 of the books in my backlog by the end of the year. I’m even keeping a log. :)
I finished reading book #2 of the reading challenge last night. I didn’t intend to read that much yesterday, but I got sick and didn’t feel like doing anything else.
Crying for the Moon isn’t the same book I started reading after I finished reading book #1. This one was just something that caught my eye as I was scrolling through the books on my phone while I was resting on the couch.
It was a nice diversion while I recovered from whatever was wrong with me yesterday evening. :)
After I finished this one, I went back to the book I’d started after finishing book #1 and started reading it again. :D
It’s a fantastic book and I don’t know why I jumped to another book, but that’s not uncommon with me, so just go with it and realize that this kind of thing doesn’t say the first thing about the quality of any of the books I’m reading. As I’ve said before, I’ve always jumped from book to book, often reading on many books at the same time. It’s just what I do.
Also, I don’t know why I didn’t recognize that as a sign that maybe writing on multiple books at once might be a good fit for me.
Ah, well. Live and learn! :D